Take the Heat Read online

  “Say yes, Grace.”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  His voice turned gravelly, his breath erratic. “Say yes.”

  I didn’t really have a choice, because it wasn’t only about this moment with him and me. It was about my brother and our childhood. It was about all the circumstances that had led to this. Maybe it was inevitable that he and I would be together. Maybe everything had been leading to this.

  “Yes.”

  He took me at my word, dipping low to the damp lips of my sex. I shivered with the sudden touch, but just as quickly, it was gone. He spun me around and pressed me back into the wall.

  His mouth fused to mine, a sudden onslaught I should have been prepared for but wasn’t. I gasped, and that gave him the opening he needed. He pushed inside, all tongue and teeth and a need I couldn’t have predicted. He touched every part of my mouth, reaching inside, hungry for it. For me.

  I stood there, passive, in a state of shock. I couldn’t comprehend all the ways he could touch me. Hot and wet with his mouth. Firm and controlling with his hands. His whole body was flush against mine, pulsing with his arousal. I could feel his erection against my belly, could feel his excitement in the pant of his breath. And deep inside, I felt him too.

  My body stirred, preparing itself for him. That’s all this was, a clinical procedure. He would be inserting, and I would receive him. Lube was required for such an act, and so my body produced it, slickening my folds and throbbing with readiness.

  Except nothing about this felt clinical, not the old-world penthouse or the man almost rabid with need. Nothing about this felt real, and I let the magical pretend quality float me away.

  This was a dream. A thing that wasn’t really happening.

  I could enjoy it.

  “Kiss me back,” he muttered as his lips moved over my jaw.

  The first touch of my hand on his chest, tentative, made him groan low in his throat. I curled my fingers around his collar and tugged gently. He pushed hard against me—no finesse, just shoved me straight into the wall with his body, as if he could join us that way. Not with his cock or his tongue, just pressing so hard that we’d be one person.

  When his lips met mine again, I opened for him. I let him inside and did more than that. I touched my tongue against his. I was trembling. A leaf on the sidewalk, moving with the wind. He should crush me with that kind of force, but all I did was flit and tumble, turning over and over, dizzy with passion.

  I woke up though, a little, when he pulled away. It was impossible to remain completely dazed when he looked at me that way. My shirt was pulled up, revealing my breasts. My skirt was around my waist—the work his hands had done. I was exposed for him, but he didn’t look at my body.

  He looked me straight in the eyes when he said, “I’ve wanted you for so long.”

  Then it felt all too real, and I didn’t know what to do with that. I didn’t know where to put these feelings inside me except in the bins marked wrong and gullible and stupid little girl. I wasn’t a girl anymore. I shouldn’t want him at all.

  I couldn’t stand the way he looked at me. As if I wasn’t a child, and not just because I could have sex now. But because he wanted something deeper from me, something more meaningful than a girlish crush. Except I had nothing left to give him.

  Desperate to direct his attention away, I asked, “Where’s the bedroom?”

  Disappointment flickered in his eyes, so briefly I might not have seen it. Might not have recognized it, if I hadn’t felt the same thing five years ago when he’d told me no, he wouldn’t be my boyfriend.

  He said he’d wait for me.

  But it had been a long time since I believed a word he said. He may not have meant that promise to a teenaged girl, but I could only hope he followed through on this deal with Benny’s debt. I had sold him my body but not my heart. He could use one all he wanted. I wouldn’t let him touch the other.

  * * *

  The bed was a bad idea. It had been my idea, so I couldn’t even pin this on Liam. I could pin the whole blackmail-coercion-sex on him, sure, but the bed had been my lame attempt at distraction, and here we were.

  Beds were for lovers. They were for staying up late talking and sleeping in. They were for passionate sex with someone you actually cared about. We weren’t going to do any of that. He was going to use me, and I was going to be used. That was the point, really. The coercion had to be part of the appeal for him, because he was a handsome man. Objectively I admitted he could get any woman he wanted. So the only reason he’d done this was to make me feel like shit.

  And it was working. I sat in the middle of the bed, my clothes rumpled and twisted around me, miserable. I thought about running again, but it was more of a hypothetical than an actual plan. He would only catch me again. And where would I go? The word home was a joke. My cold apartment was just a room. I felt more at home in the courtyard of the Magnolia than I ever had in the trailer park I’d grown up in.

  He wandered to the corner of the room, and I could almost believe he was detached, if he hadn’t been practically inhaling me sixty seconds ago. The tension in the room was electric, raising the hair on my arms and shooting sparks through my body.

  “Undress for me.”

  I knew the way he meant it. Not just taking off my clothes to give him access. He meant a striptease, but I had no idea how to put on a sexy show. I’d only had sex with one guy, a boyfriend in my senior year of high school, and both of us had fumbled our way through the dark.

  It had been awkward but also intimate. Raw. That was me—unpolished. If Liam had wanted a stripper, why hadn’t he hired an actual professional who knew what she was doing?

  Because he wanted to humiliate me.

  That was the only answer. And I resented him for it, even though I knew it wasn’t quite fair. After all, he was basically paying $15,000 for the dubious privilege. The deal helped me more than it did him, so I should really stop hating him—but I couldn’t.

  My first moves were jerky and uncoordinated. My shirt came off in bits—one arm and then these leftover buttons and then this other arm. The skirt didn’t fare much better. I had to unbunch it from my waist and smooth it out before it could come down. And then my panties, which were serviceable white. My bra was last, which seemed backward, really. And he’d already seen my breasts earlier, when he pushed the white lace aside. But still I blushed when the straps fell down my arms. I held the cups to my chest, hoping.

  He approached me like a panther, low to the ground, but that was an illusion. He had power, so much power. The power to pinch the center of my bra, the ribbon connecting to the two sides, between his forefinger and thumb. He tugged, so gently, and I had to let it go. Had to let go of modesty and pride and hope as it landed with a quiet whoosh.

  Finally, finally, I met his eyes. It didn’t matter that what I’d done was awkward and ungainly, his eyes still burned with a kind of want I couldn’t quite comprehend. What would it feel like to want someone’s body quite that much, as if it were air and water and land—as if the person were earth itself and home besides?

  “Will you hate me after this?” he asked mildly, as if he didn’t care about the answer. I suspected he did care, though. I suspected that some part of that laughing, teasing boy was still inside, the one who would never have made me cry.

  Until he did.

  “I already hate you,” I answered softly.

  “Then this won’t matter.”

  And then he was pushing me, laying me back onto the bed. He didn’t kiss me this time—not on the mouth. He nuzzled my breasts, kissing me there instead. He nibbled his way down the curve of them as if taking their measure. His mouth closed around my breast, hot and teasing. The suction pushed my hips off the bed, pressing against his body, futile and rhythmic.

  He pushed my hips back down. “Stay.”

  Stay down, he meant. Stay still. Not seeking my own pleasure. My cheeks heated with embarrassment. When had I started to enjoy this? I could
n’t enjoy this. But I couldn’t deny the throb in my pussy either. It clenched and clenched, wanting to be filled.

  He wouldn’t though. Maybe he was a sadist after all, because he knew exactly what my body wanted and he refused, moving down my hip instead. He kissed the curve of my hip, and then he—he bit me. Right there, where the skin smoothed over muscle and bone. Where it hurt. I yelped, just a little, and then his tongue was on me, soothing over the spot.

  His gaze met mine as he slid a hand between my legs.

  I tensed, even though it was too late for doubts or second chances. He didn’t give me time anyway. He just found my slit with an accuracy that unnerved me. He pushed two fingers inside—it wasn’t even dry. No, the slippery channel accepted his fingers readily, just sucked them in, greedy. I couldn’t do anything but lie there, feeling my body betray me.

  Then it got worse.

  He lowered his head and…licked my clit. Just licked it with the flat of his tongue, and the pleasure was sharp enough to be pain. My legs trembled with the effort to stay open. I wanted to snap them shut, to keep him out. But he was already there, already with his fingers inside me and his lips circling my clit. He sucked, and I had to disobey—my hips came off the bed. He’d told me not to, he’d told me to stay as if I were dog, but I couldn’t listen to him anyway. Pure need coursed through my clit, my pussy. It throbbed in my breasts, even when he reached up and caressed them.

  I couldn’t understand why he was doing this instead of hurting me. Instead of humiliating me.

  God, that tongue. It felt like silk, like he was wrapping all around me from that one small place. Like he was binding me and no matter how hard I bucked and pushed with my hips, I couldn’t break free. I only wanted more, and his fingers—thank the Lord for those fingers—they searched inside me, finding the key. He twisted his hand, just so, and then I broke apart, coming on his fingers and against his mouth, crying out his name as if he would save me.

  My body still pulsed when he withdrew. His lips glistened with my arousal.

  He could have mocked me for this. I’d said I hated him and then came for him harder than I’d ever come. It could have been his crowning moment, except he didn’t look mocking or cruel. Instead he looked…desperate. His cheeks were flushed with color, his breath coming in bellows. When he stood up, I could see the erection tenting his pants, almost completely horizontal despite the wool fabric restraining it. He looked close to bursting, and unbidden, a sense of tenderness rose up in me.

  I sat up and reached for his belt. He let me unbuckle and unzip him while he dealt with his shirt. I pulled down his boxers too, and he hissed in a breath as the air met his erection. I could understand why, when I saw how hard he was, how red and taut the skin was. He must be sensitive there. So sensitive it would ache, and I understood that.

  I thought I would return the favor and suck him, but he pushed me back so I was lying on the bed. He climbed up, straddling my torso, holding his cock in his fist.

  “I’m sorry,” he said hoarsely. “If this is the only time I get with you, I have to do this now.”

  Do what now? I wasn’t sure, but I got the idea when he fondled my breasts. When he pulled the nipples until they were hard and red points. When he stroked himself roughly and quickly, then I knew.

  He wanted to come on my breasts.

  That was his fantasy, the one he had to do now, his only chance. It made me feel strange inside, part aroused and part proud, like I had done this to him. Like I’d meant something, even if it was only a tawdry sexual dream.

  But oh, when he came, it didn’t feel tawdry at all. His face screwed up into a mask of agony and ecstasy. His fist jerked once, twice, pulling back to expose the shiny head of his cock. It jetted out creamy streams onto my breasts, my belly, hot and shocking.

  He painted me that way, the way I painted a canvas—honest and vulnerable. And even though I should hate him for this, should probably feel low about what had just happened, I stroked his thigh, soothing, telling him without words that this part, at least, had been safe.

  * * *

  He got a warm washcloth and cleaned me up, but I could see sleep overtaking him. I could see the shadows under his eyes. From stress? Why wasn’t he sleeping? And why did I care? Then it didn’t matter anymore, because he climbed into the bed and pulled me close.

  A few minutes later, the steady rhythm of his breath told me he was sleeping.

  With his arms circling me and his leg flung over me and his face pressed into my hair, he was sleeping. It made my heart feel full, and I couldn’t deny what it meant anymore. I wasn’t falling for him; I was already at the lowest point. I’d fallen in love with him as a teenager, and no amount of denial or anger or wishing things different had changed that.

  And it was useless. He had just, essentially, paid me to have sex with him. It had been a form of coercion, really, with the threat to my brother in the same room. That wasn’t the basis for a relationship. Even if he wanted one.

  Even if I wanted one.

  God, this was crazy. It made me shake and twist in my own skin, as if I couldn’t figure myself out. And it was too hot, far too hot in the embrace of his body. I had to pull away, to catch my breath.

  But when I stood up, naked in the dark hotel room, I wasn’t sure where to go next. I could get dressed and leave. I wasn’t sure if the guards at the doors would stop me, but I could try a fire escape. But what if Liam got mad and thought I’d reneged on the deal? What if he went after Benny again?

  Except…what had he said at the end? He’d said if this was the only time he had with me. As if we might not have sex again. And I didn’t understand how that would work when I owed him fifteen thousand dollars, when we’d made this deal to compensate him. How could one time be worth fifteen thousand dollars?

  Maybe the sex was only interest, designed to delay the full payment. I really should have made him spell out the details when we’d made the deal. But I’d never been a good businessperson, which was why Benny had sold my paintings for me—even though that hadn’t turned out well either.

  I found his dress shirt crumpled on the floor. When I pulled it on, the musky scent of him suffused me. I wandered into the living room again, running my fingertip along the wall.

  Whatever illegal things had been done in this room since Liam had bought the place, they hadn’t changed the building itself. It still vibrated with a sort of charm and goodwill. It still made me feel safe.

  Did he live up here, in the penthouse? He must, because although the room was clean, I saw a book propped like a tent on a side table and a half-empty coffee mug on the small dining table. That meant he also slept in the bed where we’d just had sex.

  He’d sleep there again tonight. But would I?

  I felt a little like a voyeur walking through his rooms. The wires in my brain had crossed. I was curious about the Magnolia Hotel; I was curious about Liam. I couldn’t separate them anymore. I loved the hotel…and I couldn’t pretend to hate Liam anymore. Not after what we’d just done.

  The last room I came to was a study.

  It had gorgeous walnut siding and a beautiful carved desk, but I couldn’t think about those. All I saw were the paintings on the walls. Four of them, one for each wall. And another one propped up against the wall as if waiting to be hung.

  My paintings.

  Vivid royal blues and a pale peachy pink. Damask fading into a rusted copper.

  My breath came short and then not at all. I clutched my hands to my stomach as if it could hold me in, rein back what I felt, what I hoped. I’d always known that the hotel inspired me, both real and imagined. But what I hadn’t realized was that I’d been painting for the hotel. That these painting were designed to fit here and become part of the place I loved.

  Liam had bought them. This was how he’d known for sure my brother was cheating me.

  He had bought them for a lot of money too, and why would he do that if my family already owed him money? In fact, why would he make th
at deal with me, when I would have found a way to pay him the debt, when he could have had another woman for far less, for nothing at all?

  A sound came from the door. He stood wearing only his slacks, leaning against the door frame but looking far from casual.

  “So, you found them.” His voice gave him away. Gravelly and thick with leftover sleep.

  “You bought my paintings,” I said, shaken.

  “Yeah, well. You’re a good artist. I always said that.”

  He had told me that. Back when we’d been kids and I’d squeezed every last drop from the tubes of paint to make them last. Later, I’d assumed he was just being nice to the little girl from the same trailer park, the one with a crush on him.

  My tongue felt tied up in knots. “You said you’d wait for me.”

  “I said I’d wait for you to grow up. And you did.”

  “Then why…all this?” I waved my hand. Why the Magnolia Hotel and my brother? Why force me?

  “Would you have come any other way?”

  No, he was right about that. I would have slammed the door in his face, hurt about what he had turned into. Afraid of it. He still scared me, but I also knew now that he loved me.

  He shrugged. “I told you. I’m not a martyr. I take what’s mine.”

  But he wouldn’t really, I knew that too. What he’d said as he came over me, that it might be our last time, it was because he wouldn’t force me to be here if I didn’t want to. He wouldn’t force me to come back.

  There was only one problem with that. I wanted to stay.

  “I won’t fight you,” I whispered.

  He tried to hide how that affected him; he really did. He swallowed and looked away. “Grace, I know this is wrong.”

  I shook my head, but he didn’t see. So I went up to him. I reached out and turned his chin toward me. His gaze met mine. I reached down, to that honest and vulnerable place, the same place I painted from. “This is the only thing that’s ever been right in my life.”